


Begin Again

by VerdantMoth



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Café, M/M, New Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-25
Updated: 2018-08-25
Packaged: 2019-08-23 06:53:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16614032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VerdantMoth/pseuds/VerdantMoth
Summary: The cafe isn’t new, but Gwaine has never been here before. He’s passed this cafe 162 times this year, but he and Merlin had a their own place. He’d continued going there for months after Merlin left. Many months.





	Begin Again

 

The cafe isn’t new, but Gwaine has never been here before. He’s passed this cafe 162 times this year, but he and Merlin had a their own place. He’d continued going there for months after Merlin left.  Many months.

He sets up here, the way he had at the old cafe. Notepad to the left, laptop directly in front of him.

He’s waiting for the coffee he ordered to arrive, and staring at the phone sitting on his left thigh. Waiting for it to light up, for the bells to trill. Waiting like he has been since March. His screen stays dark.

Someone bumps his table, causing him to glance up. A pretty blonde smiles at him, blue eyes sparkling. Gwaine catches the ring glittering, and tracks her eyes to a pretty dark haired lady.

“Sorry. I got distracted.”  There’s a blush on her cheeks and floral tea on Gwaine’s elbow, but he nods and his heart isn’t stuttering.

“It’s cool. I distract most people.” He winks. She rolls her eyes, but she smiles and hands him some napkins before slipping through the crowded tables back to her lady.

A plate lands at at Gwaine’s elbow, and he tracks the thick wrist to a thicker forearm up to an even thicker attached to a barrel of a chest.

“I didn’t order a croissant.”

“Raspberry orange. On the house. Since our recently engaged barista spilled tea on you.”

Gwaine looks up, sees short cropped hair and blue eyes.  _ Blue, blue  _ eyes, that make him think of rain and mud and silence.

“It’s a big croissant.”

The server laughs a little and shrugs. “Elyan, our baker, thinks all pastries should be big and filling.”

“Still a lot for one person.”  He hesitates, tries to remember the last time he did something like this. “Split it with me?”

The server pauses a moment, stares at Gwaine hard. “Break is in fifteen minutes. Think you’ll still be here then?”

Gwaine glances down, studies the pastry, and then glances back at the server. Everything in him is saying  _ don’t  _ , but he ignores it. “Yeah. Yeah I think I will be.”

The server grins, big and infectious, and says, “All right. See you in fifteen minutes….?”

“Gwaine.”

“Percival.”  Gwaine’s hand is caught in a firm shake that lingers before Percival blushes, bright red, and pulls away.

“Okay Gwaine. Fifteen minutes.”

  
  



End file.
